for the Glory of God.

We have a problem we are facing, there is so much False dangerous teaching out there. for example we have famous preachers saying things that people are eating up because it seems like truth and it sounds nice to the ears.

Steven Furtick - God broke the law for Love. His claims are that God was confined to the law and couldn't save us so in order to be able to save us from our sin God had to break the law of God to save our sin. But we know this to be wrong, God fulfilled the law.

Sarah Young - Jesus Calling - She claims to have heard from God new revelation apart from the Bible. I knew that God communicated with me through the Bible, but I yearned for more. Increasingly, I wanted to hear what God had to say to me personally on a given day.” But the Bible teaches that it is God breathed and she says there is no need for it then.

Brian Johnson - Bethel Church - In his book The Physics of Heaven - There are anointings, mantles, revelations and mysteries that have lain unclaimed, literally where they were left, because the generation that walked in them never passed them on. I believe it’s possible for us to recover realms of anointing, realms of insight, realms of God that have been untended for decades simply by choosing to reclaim them and perpetuate them for future generations. Nowhere in the Bible does it claim this.

Progressive Christianity - There are many churches That are starting to teach progressive Christianity. What we see in this is a lowered view of the Bible, feelings and experiences tend to be valued over fact, essential Christian doctrines are becoming open for re-interpretation based on whatever hot button topics are being dealt with in the world (heaven forbid we disagree with the world, The heart of the gospel message shifts from sin and redemption to social justice, Historic terms are re-defined to meran whatever people want them to mean. This is a very dangerous trend and can be hard to spot.

Have you ever been tempted to change a word of the Bible to make it communicate something you wish it said? Ever been inclined to leave out certain verses that make you uneasy … or add ones that make you feel a little more comfortable? That's exactly what Old Testament scholar and NIV Translation Committee member Dr. Andrew Shead believes has happened with The Passion Translation (TPT)

Psalm 18:1 NIV: "I love you Lord, my strength." ESV: "I love you, O Lord, my strength." KJV: "I will love thee, O LORD, my strength." TPT: "Lord, I passionately love you! I want to embrace you, For now you’ve become my Power!"

Ephesians 5:22 is also mangled. Instead of saying, “Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord,” Simmons translates the end of verse 21 as “be supportive of each other in love,” and then proceeds to rewrite verse 22 to say, “For wives, this means being devoted to your husbands like you are tenderly devoted to our Lord.” This is quite politically correct, but it does not correspond to what Paul wrote.

I could keep going but you get the point I think. Not everyone may like the fact that I have called out some famous people as false teachers but that is okay, this is what the Bible tells us to do. But the reason why I do this is for a different reason. we are to prone to wander and forget the basic truths of the Christian faith which we know not to be clever myths but the very truth of God. Everything that is required for living a Godly life has been given to us for the glory of God but The purpose of which we may share in eternal glory not worldly corruption.

For this reason above, we need to go back to the basics of the faith and learn what is the right doctrine of God so as not to become useless and unfruitful in our knowledge of our faith. This is the idea we are going to go through

HBI -there are many teachings that may lead us astray so we need to go back to the basics and know right doctrine an how it affects our lives so we may grow in God.

1:1-9 - Back to the basics

Peter seemed to know He was not going to be long for this world, He will not always “be in the bodily tent”. Even if he did not, there is a sense of urgency in the last letter Peter wrote. We like sheep are prone to wander away. We get distracted by the next fads that come our way. When what we believe suddenly becomes unpopular we tend to want to balk and claim some other truth except for what the bible says. Like Peter when confronted with knowing Jesus denied Him rather then claim to know the man dying on the cross.

we start out with a typical greeting. 2 Peter 1:1-2

2 Peter 1:1–2 CSB

1 Simeon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ: To those who have received a faith equal to ours through the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ. 2 May grace and peace be multiplied to you through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.

Lets look into this passage and see what God has for us. Why does it say Simeon and not just Simon? The common old Hebrew spelling is what we see here Simeon is the way of spelling Simon. Simon used to be His name and then Jesus changed His name to Petros. Which is the Greek translation of the Aramaic word for rock. Jesus changed His name to have significance, meaning on this “Petros” I will build my church. Peter was told He was going to be instrumental in the building of the church and the gospel going out to the gentiles.

Peter also gives a twofold identification of himself, a servant and an apostle. as we read in 1 Peter, his identification as a servant shows that he was bought by the blood of Jesus at a price and now belongs to Jesus. This is how we are to identify ourselves as well. This is our status now as followers of Jesus, you are not your own you where bought at a price.

2 Peter 1:3 CSB

3 His divine power has given us everything required for life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.

This is where it starts to get interesting. Everything that we need, that is required to live a life for the glory of God for the good of God and His glory. The basics of the faith, how to live for God as His children have been given to us already, we do not need to keep on searching for them. we have them in the word of God.

He has called us as His children - Through the goodness and glory of God are we called as His children. Nothing we can do can make us Christians. It is through God alone and His calling on our lives do we become His children.

God has divinely gifted us all we need to live a life for Him, we have all we need. We have this in the knowledge of Him that was given us. We have the basics of the faith, we have right doctrine here. We are told it was given to us by God and we need to follow it.

We need to remember this through all the dangers in the world, all the false teaching that may lead us astray, the All that is required to live a Godly life is given us here and if what we hear is not in the word of God we have been given we need to avoid it.

2 Peter 1:4 CSB

4 By these he has given us very great and precious promises, so that through them you may share in the divine nature, escaping the corruption that is in the world because of evil desire.

By these things we will escape the corrupted teachings of the world and the evils of the world we will one day escape. By living in the knowledge of God for His glory. If he has truly called us as His children then we need to seek His knowledge. Our salvation means that we will break away from the evils of the world and seek the glory of God alone.

Through coming to Jesus we escape the corruption and consequences of sin and begin to share in the divine nature, the holiness of God as we become more and more like Him.

2 Peter 1:5–7 CSB

5 For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with goodness, goodness with knowledge, 6 knowledge with self-control, self-control with endurance, endurance with godliness, 7 godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.

Because we have been called to be His children and all the promises associated with that, we can now participate in the divine nature of God that is we become part of His kingdom. We are told to make every effort to add to our faith.

Salvation, that is saving faith requires no works of our own, but it does not end there. we are told to add to our faith. Know right doctrine we are told because it needs to affect our lives. We need to get back to the basics, even as mature believers and continue to be reminded what it means to follow Jesus.

active Christianity is what we are called to. Make every effort to be active in growing in your walk with God. Make sure there is evidence of your walk with God. Make sure you know the essentials of your faith and go back and continue to be reminded of them.

2 Peter 1:8–9 CSB

8 For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being useless or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 The person who lacks these things is blind and shortsighted and has forgotten the cleansing from his past sins.

In increasing measure, that is we need to keep growing and never stop. I was researching some of the tallest men in the world. Robert Wadlow is the tallest man in recorded history and reached 8’11” and never stopped growing till he died. Imagine how tall he would be now if he had not died. Like that we need to never stop learning about OUR FAITH, KNOWING RIGHT DOCTRINE and how it affects our life. we need to become giants in our faith.

What we are called if we do not do this is useless, unfruitful, blind shortsighted. We get the point. we must strive to not become useless.

1:10-11 - So we may be sure of our Faith

We do this, we grow we learn we become sure of what is right doctrine and how to live for God because then we can become sure of our calling.

2 Peter 1:10–11 CSB

10 Therefore, brothers and sisters, make every effort to confirm your calling and election, because if you do these things you will never stumble. 11 For in this way, entry into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be richly provided for you.

As a kid going to VBS and Bible camp I would usually go up when an alter call came because I was not sure if I was saved or had messed up to much that God did not love me any more. But hear we learn we can be sure, a Christian, by growing in grace, growing in the knowledge of God becomes assured of their salvation. That is we must be moving forward in our faith.

To never stumble or fall doesn't mean losing our salvation but that a Christian who is growing and moving forward in their faith wont stay fallen, when they do fall they will seek forgiveness and keep moving.

The goal of this - entrance into the eternal kingdom of God. This is what we work toward, this is our goal and the reason we share with others the reason for the hope that is within us.

1:12-15 - May we always remember

2 Peter 1:12–15 CSB

12 Therefore I will always remind you about these things, even though you know them and are established in the truth you now have. 13 I think it is right, as long as I am in this bodily tent, to wake you up with a reminder, 14 since I know that I will soon lay aside my tent, as our Lord Jesus Christ has indeed made clear to me. 15 And I will also make every effort so that you are able to recall these things at any time after my departure.

Peter somehow knew that he was not long for this world. I like the imagery of the tent for our earthly home. I used to like tenting till we had kids then we moved on to “glamping” makes life so much easier. We went from a tent, to a tent trailer to a older camper with central heat and a/c. The eternal kingdom we are told is where we are headed if we are followers of Jesus growing in Him.

What we have now is the flimsy tent. What we look forward to is a glorious kingdom. This is why I remind us as well of what is awaiting and what it takes to get there. You may know the basics of the faith, you may have the knowledge of God but reminding is sometimes needed. So we make every effort to gain the eternal kingdom of God when we leave this worldly tent behind.

So What?

Why do we need to know this? we are told a few reasons that I will leave you with but also one we have not gone through. We will learn later that there are false teachers out their that would seek to deceive. Or maybe they do not know they are wrong but they teach false things. because of this there are a few things we need to remember.

Back to the Basics.

all that we need to live a life for God has been given us already, we have the knowledge we need, the words from the Lord are here in the word of God. we must go back to the basics and learn what it means to be called be God as His children. We need to know right doctrine and know that it does affect our lives. There are so many people that have a wrong understanding of the basics of their faith and this is what we will get into later, what are the basics of the faith. but in the mean time we need to grow in our understanding of the Lord.

So we may be sure of our faith

The way we can be sure of our calling? We do this by seeing that we start with the basics and start growing. when we fall as we are prone to do we get back up and keep going, admitting our wrong and humbly moving forward. The goal of this is entrance into the K of H. if you are not growing then you need to ask God to take a good look into your life.

Remember, Remember, Remember

May we always remember what are the essentials of our faith. Because we as humans are prone to wander, prone to fall for false doctrine we must always be reminded what are the essentials of our faith and keep growing from their. Sometimes it gets annoying to hear me repeat the same truths but reminders are a good thing. We need them, I need them constantly or I forget stuff.

our goakll, when we leave this earthly tent to be found in Jesus and live eternally with Him.